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Ethics and Equality in College Admissions

Dale Norton, Alex Flores, Doug Schwartz

University of Phoenix

Ethics in an Academic Environment-GEN 300

Dr. Michael Gottleib

September 25, 2007

Ethics and Equality in College Admissions

College admissions counselors face many decisions today when it comes to decisions that involve which students get to attend their college of choice. College admissions counselors are faced with concerns about ethics and equality. In 1996, the State of California banned affirmative action (Wooldridge, 1998). This means that colleges and universities are not able to make admission decisions based on race, sex, social class, ethnicity, or disability. Colleges in California are required to make admissions decisions based on merit and test scores. Making admission policies equal to all students seems like the best way to level the playing field. However, one problem exists. According to Wooldridge (1998, p.1), "On average, blacks and Latinos score well below whites and Asians on the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT)." This means that fewer African-American and Latino students will be accepted to college, making colleges lack diversity (Wooldridge, p.1).

College's admissions face another obstacle that is increasing in popularity. Cheating on tests and entrance exams has become a common practice for students trying to enroll in college. Athletes and non-athletes alike resort to cheating to help their chances of enrollment. The problem with cheating has become so large that schools are forced to reshape academic admission policies (Vencat, 2006).

Academic admissions counselors throughout the country are trying to come up with ideas to help maintain fair and honest enrollment policies. The goal for colleges and their admissions counselors is to ensure equal opportunities for all students. Admissions counselors have guidelines and policies in place to help them make the enrollment decisions. The only questions are: where is the line drawn on ethical, yet equal decisions?

Affirmative Action in College

Affirmative action has been a topic of debate in many different settings. College admissions counselors have a tough task of determining what is fair and what is right. When it comes to the enrollment decision, it makes sense to accept students based on their individual merits; making it equal for every student to have the same opportunities. Students prove themselves by showing what they have accomplished scholastically and throughout the community. Using this type of criteria seems simple enough for the enrollment process.

In reality, enrolling students based solely on merit and test scores is not that simple. Many groups of people in our society have not always had the same equalities as others. Wooldridge(1998, p.2) claims, "In 1995...only one black student scored 750 or above on the mathematics portion of the SAT for every 89 whites." An argument can be made that minorities and the poor lack the resources to prepare properly for these types of tests (Wooldridge, p.2). Affirmative action was designed to ensure minorities receive the same opportunities as others; even if their tests scores are not as high as non-minority students.

Enrollment counselors are faced with the challenge of deciding who to accept for enrollment. Do enrollment counselors make their decisions based on equality or ethics? Finding an answer to that question will most likely be a topic of debate for many years.

Special Admissions for Athletes

Many of the counselors are faced with this though decisions. They also face the fact that they have a great deal of pressure put on them by alumni and individuals who support the school financially. School leader in some institutions instruct the enrollment counselors to admit students who don't qualify, just to keep the donors of the school happy. This, of course, keeps the money coming that some schools say they use to provide financial aid. (Schmidt, 2006).

Many of the students, who are being admitted, after they have failed to meet the schools' minimum admission policies, are recruited athletes. Research has shown that these students will perform worse on average than other students who are similar in academics (Schmidt, 2006). Some of the athletes that are let into institutions, for the simple fact that they are athletes, are being caught cheating in the classroom. At Rice University 28 students were caught cheating in the worst ever violation of the schools code. The majority of these students were athletes. The exact number can not be revealed for confidential reasons (Ackerman, 1991).

A professor of history, at Rice University, said that student athletes are some times driven to cheat because they are let into the campus though corrupt admission policies and they are truly focused into their sport, that they don't have time to study (Ackerman, 1991). The Athletes themselves also blame their poor performance in the classroom because of all the time they spent on their sport (Sperber, 2004). These students are cheating in the classroom when they know it is wrong. Where should the blame go, when enrollment counselors also cheat to get these athletes into their school? It seems that by doing this counselor are giving the example that cheating is acceptable.

The problem with all these athletes and others are that it all starts with the admission policies placed on them. Schools give athletes special admission, special financial aid, and special academic treatment for students. Schools need to stop giving special admission to student athletes for the simple fat they are athletes and concentrate on their educational backgrounds (Sperber, 2004).

Cheating To Get In

With most of the elite colleges not growing in body size and the number of applicants continues to increase the colleges are becoming more selective. (Bernhard, 2006) With growing anxiety to meet the standards and beat out the competition cheating is becoming more prevalent. Students are paying for answers to entrance exams. They are paying people to take the exams for them.